Abortion...I would call this a theological issue

[Robert]

6 minutes ago, Green Cochoa said:

I won't speak for my mind, but I haven't lost my Bible.  I will trust my Bible over my mind any day.

Your Bible doesn't support abortion.....Life begins at conception.

Ps 139:

 13For You formed my inward parts;
            You wove me in my mother’s womb.

      14I will give thanks to You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
            Wonderful are Your works,
            And my soul knows it very well.

      15My frame was not hidden from You,
            When I was made in secret,
            And skillfully wrought in the depths of the earth;

      16Your eyes have seen my unformed substance;
            And in Your book were all written
            The days that were ordained for me,
            When as yet there was not one of them.

      17How precious also are Your thoughts to me, O God!
            How vast is the sum of them!

[Green Cochoa]

That's a beautiful passage, but it doesn't say that life began at conception.  Look for words like "became a living soul" in the Bible to find the origin of life.

[Robert]

The unborn child was granted equal protection in the law; if he lost his life, the one who caused his death must lose his own life:

Ex 21:22 “Now suppose two men are fighting, and in the process they accidentally strike a pregnant woman so she gives birth prematurely. If no further injury results, the man who struck the woman must pay the amount of compensation the woman’s husband demands and the judges approve. 23 But if there is further injury, the punishment must match the injury: a life for a life....

 

[Robert]

1 minute ago, Green Cochoa said:

That's a beautiful passage, but it doesn't say that life began at conception.  Look for words like "became a living soul" in the Bible to find the origin of life.

1 Cor 11:12 For although the first woman came from man, every other man was born from a woman, and everything comes from God.

[Robert]

Delete
 

[Green Cochoa]

8 minutes ago, Robert said:

The unborn child was granted equal protection in the law; if he lost his life, the one who caused his death must lose his own life:

Ex 21:22 “Now suppose two men are fighting, and in the process they accidentally strike a pregnant woman so she gives birth prematurely. If no further injury results, the man who struck the woman must pay the amount of compensation the woman’s husband demands and the judges approve. 23 But if there is further injury, the punishment must match the injury: a life for a life....

 

Yes, if the woman died, it was life for life--if that was her only injury, the punishment would match the injury--a fine for the abortion, as the judges determined.  It can be interpreted this way.

This is the one outlier passage that is ambiguous.  Even the scholars cannot determine from the original Hebrew between the referents in this passage.  As the Bible tells us to have two witnesses to establish something, where is your second witness?

[Robert]

2 minutes ago, Green Cochoa said:

This is the one outlier passage that is ambiguous.  

Oh, now you have certain passages that are open to more than one interpretation....

Whatever...

[Green Cochoa]

6 hours ago, Robert said:

Oh, now you have certain passages that are open to more than one interpretation....

Whatever...

Robert,

I have spent hours examining that very text, such as with theology professors at one of our major universities.  A true scholar will admit that it is less than clear.  What helps me to understand it is the impact of additional passages.  Nevertheless, your interpretation is just one possible interpretation--and I agree that it is possible.  However, where is your second witness?  For every doctrine, we are to have at least two witnesses.

 

[Robert]

Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart. —Jeremiah 1:5 Even before I was born, God had chosen me to be His. —Galatians 1:15 For You created my inmost being; You knit me together in my mother’s womb… Your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in Your book before one of them came to be. —Psalm 139:13, 16 Your hands shaped me and made me… Did You not clothe me with skin and flesh and knit me together with bones and sinews? You gave me life. —Job 10:8-12 This is what the Lord says—He who made you, who formed you in the womb —Isaiah 44:2 Did not He who made me in the womb make them? Did not the same One form us both within our mothers? —Job 31:15

[Gregory Matthews]

Robert, Green has clearly demonstrated that he has not lost his mind.

I often disagree with what Green posts.  But:  Lost his mind, you have got to be kidding.  Even when I disagree with him, he can demonstrate well reasoned thought which is worthy of consideration.

If you truly think that Green has lost his mind, you may need to go looking for yours.

 

 

 

[Robert]

44 minutes ago, Gregory Matthews said:

Robert, Green has clearly demonstrated that he has no lost his mind.

I often disagree with what Green posts.  But:  Lost his mind, you have got to be kidding.  Even when I disagree with him, he can demonstrate well reasoned thought which is worthy of consideration.

If you truly think that Green has lost his mind, you may need to go looking for yours.

I have yet to see any support for this outrageous statement:

Quote

the Bible does far more to support abortion than to oppose it.  Every statement in the Bible about abortion, save one, is in support of it.  

Isaiah warns against calling evil, good and good, evil:

Is 5:20 Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil; Who substitute darkness for light and light for darkness; Who substitute bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter!     21 Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes  and clever in their own sight!....25 On this account the anger of the LORD has burned against His people, and He has stretched out His hand against them and struck them down.

[Gregory Matthews]

Be that as it may.

Your evaulation of the status of his mind is clearly without foundation. 

 

[debbym]

the heart is deceitful above all things desperately wicked, who can know it... there is none that doeth good no not one, all our righteousness is as filthy rags. being this is true... we have been given the Holy Spirit and the word of God.

The scriptures do not hold the loss of an unborn child as equal to murder or the death of a living soul.  Those who never breathe and die remain a significant and painful loss to those who desired them, i am not attempting to diminish this reality.  But to value the unborn with greater passion than the born... is not right.

when so many children are born to be abused and neglected and to perish from trauma, hunger and various deprivations, without any adequate parenting and extremely aggressively damaging parenting.... the unborn who are protected from these forces are blessed.  Some things are worse than never being born.

If you had the resources to fully provide for every unwanted unborn child then i would be the first to say,  please go on a march to save them all.

if you are acting on your human feelings you must have an inkling that  you cannot fully rely on them... however right and righteous they are to you.

there are many social issues  that require us to not allow our feelings to rule our decisions.  This does not mean we are to become void of our hearts or humanity.  God takes out of us the heart of stone and gives us a heart that can feel.  and we are directly told to guard our hearts... for out of them are the issues of life.

we can be just as wicked in our religious convictions and our beliefs... Isaiah 58 points out the deeply religious who in all things remained completely self centered especially in the area of their spiritual life.  i quote here 

True and False Worship

58 “Shout with the voice of a trumpet blast.
    Shout aloud! Don’t be timid.
Tell my people Israel[a] of their sins!
2     Yet they act so pious!
They come to the Temple every day
    and seem delighted to learn all about me.
They act like a righteous nation
    that would never abandon the laws of its God.
They ask me to take action on their behalf,
    pretending they want to be near me.
3 ‘We have fasted before you!’ they say.
    ‘Why aren’t you impressed?
We have been very hard on ourselves,
    and you don’t even notice it!’

“I will tell you why!” I respond.
    “It’s because you are fasting to please yourselves.

so on either side of the abortion question we can have completely self righteous people... fighting and proclaiming their correctness.

To humbly find God's will and realize we cannot escape this life without struggling and suffering is seldom simple or black and white... God bears with us and with a wretched world and asks us to walk with Him in this. God sees the full measure of the cost of mental illness, disordered lives, and corruption and all the works of the flesh.... we can only see in part...  we cannot fully comprehend our own  helpless condition, like Solomons says... it is better to go to a funeral than to go to a party.  There is more wisdom there.

[Green Cochoa]

2 hours ago, Robert said:

I have yet to see any support for this outrageous statement:

I apologize that I have been too occupied with regular life today to take time heretofore to supply you with the support you need for this.  It is only right that you should desire support for the statement, albeit, had you studied the matter thoroughly on your own, you might well have discovered it for yourself.  Nevertheless, here are texts you might wish to ponder--the only texts, so far as I am aware, directly addressing abortion in the scriptures.  (Other texts addressing and defining the "soul" would be tangentially related.)  As you must know already, the word "abortion" itself is a modern word, and does not appear in the Bible.  But the concept does exist in the Bible.  To make this connection, allow me to remind you of what an abortion is.  From my dictionary:

Quote

abortion |əˈbôrSHən|noun1 the deliberate termination of a human pregnancy, most often performed during the first 28 weeks of pregnancy.• the expulsion of a fetus from the uterus by natural causes before it is able to survive independently.• Biology the arrest of the development of an organ, typically a seed or fruit.

Note that the abortion from "natural causes" would often be called "miscarriage" in today's English, a term also not mentioned in the Bible.  Yet the definition my dictionary gives as the "Biology" use is interesting: it mentions "organ," "seed," and "fruit," all of which are relevant, particular those last two.  The Bible mentions the "fruit" relative to this issue, as you have already noted.

"If men strive, and hurt a woman with child, so that her fruit depart from her, and yet no mischief follow: he shall be surely punished, according as the woman's husband will lay upon him; and he shall pay as the judges determine."  (Exodus 21:22)

Now, let's look at some other passages, beginning with the Book of Job.

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 3:9      Let the stars of the twilight thereof be dark; let it look for light, but have none; neither let it see the dawning of the day:  
 3:10    Because it shut not up the doors of my mother's womb, nor hid sorrow from mine eyes.  
 3:11    Why died I not from the womb? why did I not give up the ghost when I came out of the belly?  
 3:12    Why did the knees prevent me? or why the breasts that I should suck?  
 3:13    For now should I have lain still and been quiet, I should have slept: then had I been at rest,  
 3:14    With kings and counsellors of the earth, which built desolate places for themselves;  
 3:15    Or with princes that had gold, who filled their houses with silver:  
 3:16    Or as an hidden untimely birth I had not been; as infants which never saw light.  

Clearly, Job speaks here of his desire to have been aborted.  He wishes he had died from the womb, as an "untimely birth."  Interestingly, the word "hidden" has connotations that could lead to multiple possible conclusions in verse 16.  Regardless of those possible conclusions, the tenor of the passage as a whole cannot be mistaken: at this moment, the "untimely birth" is the most desirable thing in Job's mind to have ended his adult misery and existence.  He wishes he had been aborted.

Next let us consider Psalm chapter 58.

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 To the chief Musician, Altaschith, Michtam of David.

 58:1    Do ye indeed speak righteousness, O congregation? do ye judge uprightly, O ye sons of men?  
 58:2    Yea, in heart ye work wickedness; ye weigh the violence of your hands in the earth.  
 58:3    The wicked are estranged from the womb: they go astray as soon as they be born, speaking lies.  
 58:4    Their poison is like the poison of a serpent: they are like the deaf adder that stoppeth her ear;  
 58:5    Which will not hearken to the voice of charmers, charming never so wisely.  
 58:6    Break their teeth, O God, in their mouth: break out the great teeth of the young lions, O LORD.  
 58:7    Let them melt away as waters which run continually: when he bendeth his bow to shoot his arrows, let them be as cut in pieces.  
 58:8    As a snail which melteth, let every one of them pass away: like the untimely birth of a woman, that they may not see the sun.  
 58:9    Before your pots can feel the thorns, he shall take them away as with a whirlwind, both living, and in his wrath.  
 58:10    The righteous shall rejoice when he seeth the vengeance: he shall wash his feet in the blood of the wicked.  
 58:11    So that a man shall say, Verily there is a reward for the righteous: verily he is a God that judgeth in the earth.  

 

Here, the psalmist mentions a woman's "untimely birth" again (vs. 8).  This is the second usage in the Bible of the Hebrew word "nephel," which meant "untimely birth, abortion, miscarriage."  (See http://www.blbclassic.org/lang/lexicon/lexicon.cfm?Strongs=H5309&t=KJV for more.)  Once again, the word is used to desire that outcome--in this case, for the psalmist's enemies.

The third and final use of this Hebrew word occurs in Ecclesiastes.

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6:3    If a man beget an hundred children, and live many years, so that the days of his years be many, and his soul be not filled with good, and also that he have no burial; I say, that an untimely birth is better than he.  
 6:4    For he cometh in with vanity, and departeth in darkness, and his name shall be covered with darkness.  
 6:5    Moreover he hath not seen the sun, nor known any thing: this hath more rest than the other.  
 6:6    Yea, though he live a thousand years twice told, yet hath he seen no good: do not all go to one place?

Again, the "untimely birth" (Heb. nephel), is the "better" option.  This passage goes yet further.  It says the miscarriage/abortion is the better option when the man, had he not been aborted, would have fathered a hundred children.  A clear connection is made to the final outcome of the man, who's "soul be not filled with good."  Consider now, if you will, the prenatal influence of the strong feelings of a hatred a woman might have toward the rapist who had impregnated her and which carried over to the visible "fruit" of his crime.  How would such a child (the Bible calls such a "bastard" and such a child was not allowed to worship among the Israelites to his tenth generation!) grow up?  Would the child have much chance for overcoming the very strong negative influences in his or her childhood?  How many rapists' children end up following lives of crime and occupying prison cells?  How many will be saved?

Remember King Hezekiah?  God informed him that he would die.  He begged for his life.  He was granted another 15 years.  During this time, he fathered his son, Manasseh, who reigned 55 long years as a wicked king, misleading many from the path of right.  God's first choice, the "better" option, was to have avoided his birth--even though this meant that Hezekiah would die sooner and even though the Bible and Mrs. White tell us that Manasseh gave his heart to God at the end! And Manasseh was born to a righteous father, at that.  Did God really prefer to have had many subjects than to have just a few?  It appears so . . . which brings me to the last text--from Jesus Himself.

"The Son of man goeth as it is written of him: but woe unto that man by whom the Son of man is betrayed! it had been good for that man if he had not been born." (Matthew 26:24)

Jesus would rather that Judas had never been born, than that he would have betrayed Him.  Wow.  That is some real food for thought.

[Gregory Matthews]

Green said, below:

First, I will thank Green for his work in responding to the question asked him.  His response is well worth study by others, regardless of agreement with him.

However, I will point out that abortion from natural causes is also often called abortion today.  As a result, we have women who have undergone a voluntary abortion and are not aware of it!

When fetal death occurs, the body will, at its own time and place, discharge the products from the body.  That time and place may not be a time and place that the woman would choose.  To prevent this untimely discharge of fetal products, the woman may under go a medical procedure that will remove them in a hospital.  That procedure is often called a "voluntary abortion" for insurance purposes.  They woman may not know that unless her insurance company does not provide abortion coverage and therefore refuses to pay for the medical procedure.

In such cases, the woman should appeal  the decision of the insurance company not to pay for the abortion.   When it is made clear that fetal death naturally occurred prior to the medical procedure, the insurance company will typically pay for the procedure.

NOTE:  If you ask if any medical insurance fails to provide for voluntary abortions, I am aware of one of the largest providers of medical insurance in the United States that does not provide for voluntary abortion coverage.

 

 

Note that the abortion from "natural causes" would often be called "miscarriage" in today's English,. . .

[Robert]

4 hours ago, debbym said:

The scriptures do not hold the loss of an unborn child as equal to murder or the death of a living soul.

The "unborn child" is not a "living soul"?

[Robert]

19 hours ago, Green Cochoa said:

 Who will say God will not do what He says He will do?--12MR 207-209; 10MR 265 (1876).  {LDE 241.3} 

"Father, if thou be willing, remove this cup from me (Jesus as the son of man): nevertheless not my will, but thine, be done."  Luke 22:42 KVJ

 

What is this cup - "the cup of the wine of His fierce wrath" (Rev 16:19)?

 

The cup that Christ drank from is the same cup that the rejectors of His righteousness drink.  These will  "drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his indignation." (Rev 14:10)

 

Jesus experienced that cup.  He experienced the 2nd death - the wrath of God.

 

How?   Traditionally most believers only see: "I [God] will strike the Shepherd. . . . (Therefore they see Him) stricken, smitten by God" (Mark 114:27; Isaiah 53:4).

 

Did God strike Christ?  Was He stricken, smitten by God?

 

No, God abandoned Christ.....

 

My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me? (Mark 15:34).

 

Then my wrath shall be kindled against them in that day, and I will forsake them, and I will hide my face from them, and they shall be devoured, and many evils and troubles shall befall them; so that they will say in that day, Are not these evils come upon us, because our God is not among us? 

 

 

[Robert]

6 hours ago, Green Cochoa said:

Quote

 3:16    Or as an hidden untimely birth I had not been; as infants which never saw light.  

Clearly, Job speaks here of his desire to have been aborted.  

By "aborted" you mean miscarriage....

This is no way supports abortion....To say it does is ludicrous to the nth degree... 

[Robert]

8 hours ago, Green Cochoa said:

 If a man beget an hundred children, and live many years, so that the days of his years be many, and his soul be not filled with good, and also that he have no burial; I say, that an untimely birth is better than he. 

Never, not for one moment, do any of these quotes allow the murder of unborn children.  It's up to God to end life if that life is not going to be filled with good.  Are you God?  Is an abortionist, God?

[Green Cochoa]

7 minutes ago, Robert said:

The "unborn child" is not a "living soul"?

Does it have the "breath of life"?

None of us has life apart from the living chain of life that goes all the way back to Adam.  However, when Adam walked this earth alone, how many "souls" existed?  Was your soul in Adam?  What, then, defines the separation between Adam's soul and yours?

According to the Bible, it is breath.  In virtually every culture of the world, people agree with this definition.  We count someone's age from his or her day of birth.  Why?  Because when you are born, and the umbilical cord is cut, you now have your own "breath of life."  While it is indisputably true that the newborn's "life" existed prior to his or her birth--that life goes all the way back to Adam in an unbroken chain--it is also true that the Adam did not consist of billions of souls, nor do we hold those of our children.

And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.  (Genesis 2:7)

While the modern definition of a day goes from midnight to midnight, the Biblical definition was from sunset to sunset.  While the modern definition of "life" is often based on brainwaves or heartbeats, the Biblical definition was based on breath--if one breathes, one is a living soul.  We may have changed the definitions, obscuring their significance, but I don't see God as the one who moved.

The genealogy of our race, as given by inspiration, traces back its origin, not to a line of developing germs, mollusks, and quadrupeds, but to the great Creator. Though formed from the dust, Adam was "the son of God."  {PP 44.3}  

[Robert]

10 hours ago, Green Cochoa said:

"The Son of man goeth as it is written of him: but woe unto that man by whom the Son of man is betrayed! it had been good for that man if he had not been born." (Matthew 26:24)

Jesus would rather that Judas had never been born, than that he would have betrayed Him.  

You are looking at this totally wrong.....

If Judas' mother would have had a miscarriage Judas would have been raised in the first resurrection.  But since Judas did not die; grew up to be an adult  and hardened his heart, he will be raised in the 2nd resurrection to face the "curse of the law".

Again, Jesus isn't condoning abortion.  As an Adventist I can't believe that you are even suggesting this.

[Robert]

11 minutes ago, Green Cochoa said:

Does it have the "breath of life"?

None of us has life apart from the living chain of life that goes all the way back to Adam.  However, when Adam walked this earth alone, how many "souls" existed?  Was your soul in Adam?  What, then, defines the separation between Adam's soul and yours?

According to the Bible, it is breath.  In virtually every culture of the world, people agree with this definition.  We count someone's age from his or her day of birth.  Why?  Because when you are born, and the umbilical cord is cut, you now have your own "breath of life."  While it is indisputably true that the newborn's "life" existed prior to his or her birth--that life goes all the way back to Adam in an unbroken chain--it is also true that the Adam did not consist of billions of souls, nor do we hold those of our children.

I hope that you really don't believe this nonsense...Perhaps you watched too many episodes of the Twilight Zone?

What you are doing is justifying murder.  This sounds like something Hitler would have formulated. If you are depending on your mother's oxygen then you are soulless - so murder is okay.

[Green Cochoa]

4 minutes ago, Robert said:

You are looking at this totally wrong.....

If Judas' mother would have had a miscarriage Judas would have been raised in the first resurrection.  But since Judas did not die; grew up to be an adult  and hardened his heart, he will be raised in the 2nd resurrection to face the "curse of the law".

Again, Jesus isn't condoning abortion.  As an Adventist I can't believe that you are even suggesting this.

Then do you believe that Jesus values the pre-born more than the born?

"But whoso shall offend one of these little ones which believe in me, it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea" (Matthew 18:6).

That is, if you will, an "adult abortion" which Jesus advocates here.  

[Green Cochoa]

5 minutes ago, Robert said:

I hope that you really don't believe this own nonsense...Perhaps you watched too many episodes of the Twilight Zone?

I don't recall ever seeing the program once.  I have heard of it.  I don't have a TV.  But I have my Bible.

[Robert]

2 minutes ago, Green Cochoa said:

Then do you believe that Jesus values the pre-born more than the born?

 Jesus values all life.